Albert Camus
The Plague

Nothing ever right after my mom died
Decay
Decline
Despair

She's buried in Toledo
But I haven't yet been to her grave
She lives inside of me
I still miss her every day

                   No words to pray.

I would like to go to Germany
Maybe Heidelberg
Sausage and sauerkraut
Ride a speeding train

But now I just drive my car
One task a day
Try to clean my place
Purple Rain! Purple Rain!

I wonder if she thinks of me?
No way to ever know
Lorca wrote poems
Channeling Muslim Spain

In my solitude
She haunts me
It doesn't end:
My miserable brain

I sit alone in the Chinese restaurant
What dreams may come
Dumplings for my dinner
Dum dee do dum dum

I saw Shakespeare in Staunton
In London Mozart Christmas Eve
Satellite Beach, Florida
Hutch, Mike, and Steve

The little way is wisdom
Patientia
Therapy for my son
Christian Kabbalah

                          Ah!

Little Sage Ridge School
Little Reno, Nevada
I taught Julius Caesar
Coached some basketball

It's been a year and a half
Since I've seen a psych ward
Get my injections
River Eden, Wetheral

                    Right, y'all?

Drive south from Seattle
San Francisco Zen
Only for an hour
3710

Portland's Japanese garden
Ah! Susan - what might have been
The silence is eternal
Silence be my friend

                        And then?

Yes, Fr. Tracy.

55 and falling
Far from Susan Meek
Cosmic distances
Aliens we seek

He bought my lunch today
For which I say thanks
Studying Charlemagne
He was King of the Franks

I'm not King of anything
My comfy couch is green
All That Jazz
Mr. Ben Vereen

3 prayers for Chicago
But I am in DC
In Tel Aviv the wedding
In Dublin meant to be

                      Si.

3 tragedies and a satyr play
         Night after day
             Still xie xie

small victories
the little way
        tak

Just an amateur poet
I try to tell my story
Not for lots of money
Not for endless glory

But for you, dear reader,
This life so solitary
Therefore, I reach out
Let it be, Mother Mary

               xie xie

Two of my sons are skiing
One is in therapy
I'm eating Mexican food
Mother Mary: Let it be.

California dreamin'
Lake Tahoe snow
San Francisco fog
Over the bridge does blow

I like American music
I rode the Asian trains
Schopenhauer is right that reading
Is thinking with another person's brain

Encounters with Chinese Hermits
Rainy mist Seattle
One man to Overthrow!
Tecumseh joins the battle

                           Ole!

I was afraid of atheism in college
Maybe still am
Meaningless universe
The only truth is death

55 now
Father of 3
Please, O Life, protection.
Please. Xie xie ni.

                   We...

We practice driving today
He does very well
Gracias xie xie
We are the Witherells!

USA in trouble
4 more years of this!
San Francisco fog
A little Irish mist

Maryland is boredinary
Tacos for my meal
I wonder if Eliade is right:
Only the paradigmatic is the real.

DC soon for basketball
We still have the snow
Fatherhood is gratitude
On and on we go

                    Yo espero ...

Dante. Huck Finn. Joan.

Yes, Fritz.

I'm tired and I'm lonely
In my solitude
I write telephonely
But I do not intrude

All the ice and snow
Black the night an ocean
Yoko yo yo yo yo!
This world in crazy motion

Grateful when peace comes
Promises to keep
JMU alums
Peacefully to sleep

                      Sleep.

small victories
little way
phone calls
si xie xie

quiet nights
home alone
solitude
cell phone

fatherhood
ice and snow
kindnesses
solamente yo

          so ...

The USA has elected a Demagogue
How bad will things get?
Somewhere across the border
Sleep 'neath auburn skies

                      I tries.

Reading the news, so depressing
I pause. Into the night.
The world is a madhouse
Please courage in the Fright

One day older
Mother Mary Might
Patientia
Abgescheidenheit

I have known hospitals
Psych wards
Medicine
Injections

If I pray
When I pray
For my sons:
Protection.

                        Amen

I thank God for the ordinary
A little dailiness
No grand drama
A little peace, I guess

Eating, drinking, sleeping
Surfing on my phone
Grateful for nothing special
With family. On my own.

                     Rome.

Tokyo to Kyoto
Seattle to San Francisco
              Zen

Didn't do that well in Chicago
An intellectual I am not
3 prayers for Ry
7 hopes for Scott

Once I was a teacher
Mostly 7th grade
Now I sleep quite late
Sparkling lemonade

I'm tired and I'm lonely
I yearn for Susan Meek
Yo soy un isolato
Yo soy un board game geek

My burden is bipolar
Wish I was a shaman
Chinese food tonight
Plus a little Ramen

                    Snow!

There's no life after death
Is there life before?
Rain all day today
Inner Harbor, Baltimore

Woke up from a dream in Charlotte
Un Escritor
2015
4044

                   por favor, Senyor

In one of is earlier incarnations
Pythagoras was a bird.
And in another he was a fish.

He said.

So Susan really is that wonderful
Not gonna lie
The Space Coast in Florida
Exoplanet sky

Chinese food today
Gyoza y shumai
Encounters with Daoist Hermits
Lai la Lai! Lai la Lai!

Suffering is caused by desire
Things fall apart
I like Dash Incredible
Not Napoleon Blown Apart

Just the little way
Try to begin again
Gratitude for dailiness
Call my sons and then ...

                    hope!

The crudeness and vulgarity
Of Donald Trump
Is the crudeness and vulgarity
Of the American people

It looks like it's all political
But it's actually all religious
Better the local school
Than many more prestigious

Mexican food yesterday
Black bean burrito
My parents both grew up
In 1950s Toledo

I like quiet libraries
Made of wood and glass
Postcards in the mail
Thus it comes to pass

Satellite Beach, Florida
1985
40 years have passed
Lucky to be alive

                  El Futuro ...

The Episcopalian churches are quaint
I like that rough grey stone
I keep growing older
Lots of time alone

Somewhere across the Border
Sleep my love and I
Alien encampments
Exoplanet sky

          Aye! Aye! Aye!

No one important
Now not even a job
Call my darling sons
Sleep in the afternoon

3 hopes for Scott
Just the little poems
Will I die at night
Underneath the moon?

                     Soon?

The sheer strangeness of life
                wifestrife
                 patience

I'm a troubled soul
Never long at ease
Susan Darlene Meek
Please, baby, please

Aliens above?
Cosmic destinies
Good things come to those who wait
And good things come in threes

                           Seas?

The transience of everything
              Buddhamind
                     Kyoto

When I lived in Reno
My boys still so young
Time flies by
Young sons sung

55 and falling
My boys older now
Little Reno, Nevada
I fold my hands and bow

                    How?

Can't stop thinkin' 'bout Reno
Oh! that big blue sky
Sage Ridge School for two years
Might reread Life of Pi

Sledding in the snow
My young sons and I
Drive to Lake Tahoe
Lai la Lai! Lai la Lai!

Tokyo to Kyoto
Upon the Shinkansen

South from Seattle
San Francisco Zen

1987
3710

Not really a question of if
More a question of when

Will I too disappear
Like I've never ever been?

I hope I rest in peace
Silence be my friend
Some good thing to do
Before the bitter end

Ah! Psychiatry
I like to pretend
Late at night and longing
Wind and water wend

                    Amen.

Politics is hideous
Cold this winter night
Alex teaching in Tucson
Sor Juana's mystic flight

Talk to my son on the phone
His voice is like a light
Slowly guacamole
My Mr. Spock kite

                 Well, alright!

Korean hot *** for my family
            another night
              please calm

The sadness
  Kindness
Compassion

kinda California
San Francisco in the mist
kinda California
******* times like this

Lake Tahoe snow
my hand upon her wrist
Donald Trump is fascism
with an American twist

                Resist!

Tacos for my lunch
Still cold and snow outside
When I was in Ireland
Quaint was Malahide

Mr. David Markson
Alone in New York City
Me a week in Rome
The Roman women are so pretty

Susan Darlene Meek
Dark hair, blue eyes
Fr. Greeley told the truth
George W. Lies

                       Lies.

small victories
  old friends
       thanks

I like the Daoist Hermits
Silent is the Way
When my loved ones suffer
For protection I do pray

A couple months in Ireland
Catholic Worker. Dorothy Day.
Poetry to write
Basketball to play

                   xie xie